Typically, signals, such as audio or video signals, may be digitally encoded for transmission to a receiving device. Video signals may contain data that is broken up in frames over time. Due to bandwidth requirements, baseband video signals are typically compressed using video encoders prior to transmission and/or storage. Video encoders may employ a coding methodology to encode macroblocks within a frame using one or more coding methodologies. In many video encoding standards, such as MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG-4, H.261, H.262, H.263, H.264, etc., a macroblock denotes a square region of pixels, which may be 16×16 in size, for example. Most of the coding processes (e.g. motion compensation, mode decision, quantization decision, etc.) occur at the level of a macroblock. In the HEVC standard, the concept of macroblock is extended to larger block size referred to as a coding unit.
According to many coding standards, video encoders and/or decoders may include entropy encoders and/or decoders that may encode and/or decode coded macroblocks using lossless compression codecs. The compression codecs used may be proprietary, but most often are based upon standards to improve interoperability. Several compression codecs used in entropy encoders and/or decoders are available, including those implementing arithmetic coding schemes and non-arithmetic coding schemes. Arithmetic coding schemes generally refer to power lossless entropy coding used by standards to maximize compression while improving video quality. Context adaptive arithmetic coding standards may further improve the video quality. Some video encoders and/or decoders, for reasons of power, latency, computational complexity, licensing, or compatibility requirements, may limit compression codecs that are available for compressing data. Thus, such video encoders may compress data using compression codecs that are less efficient than alternative compression codecs, such as the arithmetic coding codecs. Use of a less efficient compression codec may increase bandwidth necessary to transmit the encoded bitstream which was not compressed in a more efficient manner, and/or may reduce video quality as compared with more efficient compression codec. As an example, a royalty-free web video coding (WebVC) standard precludes the use of a context-adaptive binary arithmetic coding (CABAC) methodology, which may be a more efficient data compression codec and have higher video quality than other compression codecs.